Digimarc bolsters product ID business with Evrything buy

US digital watermarking company Digimarc has agreed to buy Evrything of the UK – a specialist in digitising products so they can be tracked as they flow through supply chains.

Evrything's Product Cloud platform is used by businesses to get greater insight and control over their products, and connect with consumers, by assigning each product a digital identity, and the company has been in partnership with Digimarc for the last five years.

The UK firm's technology effectively provides a cloud-based digital twin for any physical item that can be used to record its journey through its lifecycle.

Digimarc is buying the company in an all-stock deal that is expected to complete in January 2022. According to an SEC filling, the value of the deal is $50m upfront, with a second payment due next February – from zero to $50m – tied to Evrything's financial performance.

The UK firm had an annual contract value (ACV) of $3.2m in the first six months of this year, a 29 per cent increase on the same period of 2020. Digimark’s revenue meanwhile grew 12 per cent to $6.4m in the three-month period, compared to $5.8m in the same quarter of last year.

"Today, some of the world's most respected companies are using the Evrything Product Cloud to gather and applied data from and about their products as these items move through the supply chain, powering solutions such as traceability, product authentication and consumer engagement," said Digimarc chief executive Riley McCormack.

The deal has geographic benefits, instantly broadening each company's international presence.

Evrything meanwhile also has obvious synergies with Digimarc's covert identification platform, which is already being use alongside Product Cloud by some client companies.

The combined company will focus its efforts initially around areas including anti-counterfeiting based on packaging features, online brand protection, and recycling, as well as product cloud development.

"The size and utility of the product cloud is still in its infancy," said McCormack. "Today, we are combining with the market leader."

McCormack also said that no job losses are expected as a result of the merger – in fact, both companies are "aggressively hiring" in response to the market opportunity in front of them.

Evrything CEO and co-founder Niall Murphy said: "We're excited to join the Digimarc team to meet important customer needs with product data-driven solutions."